Research progress on cardio-protective drug for preventing anthracycline cardiotoxicity / 中国肿瘤临床

ABSTRACT

Anthracyclines, which include doxorubicin, epirubicin, daunorubicin, and aclarubicin, are widely used chemotherapeu-tic agents for treating hematologic and solid tumors, such as acute leukemia, lymphoma, breast cancer, gastric cancer, soft tissue sarco-mas, and ovarian cancer. Anthracyclines can be combined with other chemotherapeutics and molecular targeted drugs for cancer treat-ment. The combination of anthracyclines with other chemotherapeutic drugs is usually the standard of first-line treatment. Anthracy-clines are efficacious and potent agents with broad antitumor effects. However, these drugs may cause adverse reactions, such as hair loss, myelotoxicity, and cardiotoxicity. Hematopoietic stimulating factors, such as granulocyte colony-stimulating factor, erythropoietin, and thrombopoietin, can be used to control myelotoxicity. However, cardiotoxicity is the most serious anthracycline side effect. Clinical study results and practical observations indicate that the anthracycline cardiotoxicity is usually progressive and irreversible, especially after the first use of the drug, which may particularly cause heart damage. Therefore, the early detection and prevention of anthracy-cline-induced cardiotoxicity are important and have already gained considerable attention in clinical applications. Relevant experts from the China Society of Clinical Oncology and Hematology Branch of the Chinese Medical Association prepared the guidelines for the pre-vention and cure of anthracycline-induced cardiotoxicity in 2013. The authors reviewed the effective drugs currently used to prevent and cure anthracycline cardiotoxicity.